We were told that Baby House #2 was built as a kindergarten building... and boy, it sure reminds me of our old elementary buildings at River Valley when they told me that. The old classrooms have been converted into nurseries, offices, laundry facilities, etc. We'll take pictures later and share... but for now, back to the meeting.... the stuff you guys want to read about! ;-)
We were taken into the music room and met with Aliya (our translator), Olga (our coordinator), one of the doctors and the inspector. The inspector was a very nice Kazakh lady who was there to make sure we followed the Kazakh procedure of meeting children and she asked a few questions about us and our families. It was actually a very quick meeting.
She only asked a couple of questions...
What type of child did we wish to adopt? (a girl under 1 year of age, nationality did not matter to us)
What did we each do for a living? (T- owns and manages a Christian bookstore and J- support technology and computers for a school district - this is a new concept to them over here so I had to explain what this meant... they don't have too many IT people over here!)
Do our families support our adoption? (yes!)
Is Ryan excited about having a little sister? (yes)
The inspector did not ask about pictures, but I gave her our picture album so she could look through and see a little more about us and our family. She enjoyed looking at them. The album contains about 15 pictures. There are pictures of Tom, Ryan and I, our immediate families, the front yard and back yard of our house, the baby's room, our store, a picture of us working with kids on a mission trip, our pets, and pictures of gatherings of our extended families. (Amy K. - I included one of you and I from Cottage Cove and the inspector said she was surprised we had so many nationalities in our family!)
As she was wrapping up looking at pictures, they brought in a little girl for us to hold. She was adorable. They gave us a little review of her medical history and told us when she was born. We got to hold her and interact with her for about 10 minutes or so and then were told it was time for that groups nap and they needed to take her back. Then, they brought in another little girl that was dressed the same but quite a bit smaller. The second little girl was quite a bit smaller and had downs syndrome. She was a cutie. Again, they came and took her back as it was nap time for her as well.
Even though we only got to hold them for a few minutes each, we felt we were given sufficient time and information in order to make a decision on one of the girls. We informed the inspector and baby house doctor that we would like to begin visits with baby #1.
We begin visits tomorrow morning and will have 2 visits a day. One from 10:30-11:30 and then again from 3-4. Pictures tomorrow of the kiddo!
Until then, here are some pictures of our new apartment. It's awesome!
This is part of our kitchen. It's actually pretty big... includes gas stove, microwave, fridge/freezer.. and the washing machine!
This is part of our living room... Tom and I are guessing the living room is about 10x12 and has also become our office. We do have DSL (it's a 512Kbps connection for future travelers and current geeks). We're trying to find out how we're getting billed for this service. I don't believe the other apartment across the hall for adopters has this service.
I have other pictures of the apartment but will save some of them for future postings in case you get tired of seeing our baby.. hehehe. We will have a Christmas tree in our apartment and there is tinsel garland everywhere. Their New Years is celebrated just like our Christmas... except it seems they leave out the birth of Christ part! The start celebrating a couple of weeks before and continue a few weeks after. They give gifts, have a Santa Claus, etc. We saw him at the mall in Almaty when we were there.
Nuff for now...time to post baby pictures in the next entry!
Love you all! Be Blessed!
-jenni
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